


The Morning Paper

by Kerryopia



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Drabble, M/M, Soft and squishy boys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-22
Updated: 2018-08-22
Packaged: 2019-07-01 04:00:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 313
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15766167
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kerryopia/pseuds/Kerryopia
Summary: “If it ever gets passed here, I ain’t marrying you.”It’s 2011. New York has legalised gay marriage. The world is changing.





	The Morning Paper

**Author's Note:**

> A tribute to the softest and most excellent of boys. Even if Billy isn't technically soft.

“If it ever gets passed here, I ain’t marrying you.”

It’s 2011. New York has legalised gay marriage. The world is changing.

“Okay,” Steve says. Billy has the news on too loud on the television, but Steve still likes to read the paper with his morning coffee. Billy makes fun of him for it, calls him an old man, but he likes the habit; opening the door in the morning to the fresh Indiana air and a plastic-wrapped paper on the porch, the way the ink stains his fingertips as he reads.

He thumbs to the next page. He’s not really paying attention to what’s there, because the tv is on and too loud, too loud, but that’s not the point. His world is the noise and the space between him and the paper. It’s peaceful.

“I don’t need that shit. Too heavy.”

Steve hums lightly.

“I don’t.”

When Steve looks up, Billy has that wild, desperate look in his eyes. He used to get it a lot when they were teenagers, when everything was new and raw and terrifying. Hawkins is a small town, but overall people seem to have settled around the idea of Billy and Steve by now, so it’s been a long while since Steve last saw that look.

He takes off his reading glasses, probably smudges ink across his nose like he always does. He stands up.

Billy stares at him, frantic and bewildered and utterly lovely.

“… Okay,” Steve says, voice soft.

“I ain’t marrying you,” Billy insists, voice strained.

“Okay,” Steve says. Steve reaches through the electric air between them and strokes his hand over Billy’s hair, shorter and no longer permed as it had been when they were kids. There’s still the faintest hint of a curl, a ghost of a memory, and it tickles Steve’s nose when he leans down to kiss Billy’s temple.

“Okay.”


End file.
